1983 FIN – Commerce Department: Imported Fasteners Not a Threat
FEATURE
Ronald Reagan, U.S. President (1981-1989)
Malcolm Baldrige, Secretary of Commerce, 1981-1987. The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Improvement Award was named for the 26th Secretary of Commerce.
In 1983 the Reagan Administration’s Commerce Department ruled that imported fasteners are not threatening to impair the domestic industry’s requirements in case of a national emergency and consequently no sanctions need to be placed on imported fasteners.
In response Industrial Fasteners Institute managing director Richard Belford told FIN in 1983 that the decision by Secretary of Commerce Malcolm Baldrige has “established a precedent in this case involving fasteners which embraces the Asiatic countries into our mobilization base in the U.S. and this is a devastating thing.”
“We’ve been educated that we are a very self sufficient country as relates to our own defense needs and here’s Reagan standing up and saying, ‘I’m going to make our country the strongest in the world. We’re going to retain this supremacy and I’m going to do this, and this …'” Belford projected what he heard as the Reagan Administration’s response.
“And at the same time Reagan is saying, ‘Oh, by the way, we’re now dependent on foreign supply for fasteners today and tomorrow.'”
Click on the Fastener History section of GlobalFastenerNews.com and scroll to the headline, “1983 FIN – Reagan Administration Studies Renewing Fastener Trade Sanctions” for the rest of the story.
©1983/2010 Fastener Industry News
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